Steve Rivera and Jay Gon Salez. They have their eye on the ball on
two sums Sports Dig yet Fox Sports fourteen fifty streaming live. I mean I
heard radio wam Hey, welcome back to oting the ball here on Fox Sports
fourteen fifty. I'm Steve, You're Jay good Kevin for breaking news on Fox
Sports fourteen fifty. Again, get in here right, get our best effort.
And that's all you can read exactly on Fox Sports fourteen fifty. All
right, all right, so for breaking news today, we're gonna start off
here. Walter Davis, the former oh Yeah, Rookie of the Year,
passed away. Number six, Sweet d Yeah, number six retired, was
Rookie of the Year for the Suns. Played eleven of his sixteen seasons with
the Suns, and he passed away apparently of natural causes of sixty nine.
Well he's only sixty nine, man, man, yeah, Well she everybody's
done this, sweet Gue ninety four. But the guy from Friends, who's
from four yeah, the the Perry, the Afternoon Guy, a soap opera
guy, fifty man sixty nine only, but sweet he was, you know,
he was sort of the for the Suns. I mean, I remember
Connie Hawkins and that's how old I am, you know, one of the
originals, Dick van Arsdale and those guys. But you know, never again,
never in a big NBA fan. But always remember, you know,
Walter Davis Sweet he ever becomes sweet D a buddy of mine. We played
on a slow pitch softball team one time and everybody put you know, kind
of nicknames on the backs of the show, and he called himself. His
name was Daily, called himself. He put sweet D on his jersey because
of Walter. Yeah. Yeah, very cool. So yeah, very sad
to hear about that. Yeah, I just wanted to leave that off mentioned
that. Yeah, moving on to four time Slugger Silver twenty eleven ALCS MVP
with the Rangers, Nelson cruz is Plenty retiring after playing winter ball in the
Dominican Republic post. The last time he was in the league, I believe
he was with the Padres last Yeah, I think when he played about ten
games with them, and that was the last time we saw him in the
Biggs. Yeah. We already spoke about the World World Series viewership trend going
down. I wanted to bring this to you guys, so Arizona at home
against UCLA all time is thirteen and eleven, so just about five ye at
home against the Bruins. Arizona has held its last four opponents to less than
their season average points per game. UCLA is coming in averaging thirty point eight
eight, so pretty much thirty one points and only letting up fifteen. Arizona's
averaging thirty one in a quarter and their opponents are bringing in twenty one.
That's all I'm saying. This is gonna be a you know, a twenty
to seventeen game or something like that. It's gonna be hard to score,
mean, something that we're not used to, you know. I think it's
gonna be a you know, it's not gonna be like a you know,
a Dick told me ten to seven gangs, Steve. But I think it's
gonna be something like that, you know, twenty one, twenty twenty one
seven, which means, of course, bit over. I agree with you.
I mean they've all kind of trended that way anyway, right, Yeah,
last week was under. Yeah yeah, well Arizona is seven and one,
is six one and seven or they've it's gone under. They've gone under
like seven out of eight times. Okay, right that they were covered.
They've covered, Yeah, seven and one against the spread, so America's team,
Yeah, exactly, man. And you know what, Steve, if
I, if I wasn't the kiss of death, I would also be seven
and one. I refused to take him, even though I know recovering you
could believe he could believe whatever he is. Let me see what those weeks.
What if today I believe I believe? Yeah? Well, uh uh.
The Michigan saga continues. So now today a video was posted of this
guy, Connor Stallion's standing next to the Michigan uh, the Michigan defensive coordinator
against Ohio State last year, and you can tell from the video that he
says to the coordinator, run right, and then you can do the coordinator
yells something to onto the field to the adjustment to the defense, I guess,
and Ohio State runs the ball, run right, and Michigan stuffs it.
And so you know, there was also a conference call yesterday with all
the with all the Big Ten coaches, and then after I guess, uh,
Jim Harbaugh was excused from the call, and every coach was saying that
Big Ten's got to do something about it. They're pissed. They feel that
it's had a big impact on their games. They feel he's they think he's
cheating, they think it's it's been a huge advantage to do what they're doing
because some you know, some people have said it or even even a jedf
Fish sid I don't know how I would use that information. I don't know
how I could get it fast enough to make an adjustment. But the right
But then you see this video and you see that they're clearly doing it,
so you know, the Big ten coach are big Yeah, the Big ten
coaches they want him punished. They they want him they feel like he should
not be able to play for the Big Ten championship first of all, and
that the Big ten needs to do something. Now. The nsul A double
A is not going to do anything. They're not. They're not because there's,
you know, just the process it was, you know, you especially
right there, you have you have to tell him there's a you know,
there's they've broken the rule. They've got to have time to appeal, YadA,
YadA, YadA. But the Big ten can take they can do something
because they don't have to have they don't have any of that they can do
that, but questions would they do that with a team that's one of the
favorites to win the national chem right, And if they do, Jim Harboll's
gone. Oh I was just gonna say that if he if they do that,
he's gone. He'll leave, whether if he coaches next year, and
then you'll go somewhere else. He's got three things going on, you know,
three uh you know, quote unquote if you want to call him scandals
going on. He's got, you know, the recruiting thing, you know,
the the you know, the the recruiting during the COVID time. And
then he's got you know, the defensive coach who's got some you know,
cyber crime that he's being accused of. Yeah, yeah, you know.
And now this but this one, you know, I mean, this is
stuff that was going It's been going on this season, not just last year
or the year before. You know, there's a great article in the Athletic
talking about what the you know, they talked to three or four of the
big ten coaches. We're all saying this is crap and they need to do
something about it. What if they don't do something, well, that's it.
And if they don't do something, then you've got if if you don't
do something, you've made one school happy and you've pissed off the other o
th team, that's my point, completely pissed off the other their game,
you know, and you could you could see the other team saying, guess
what, you're fired, you know, to the to the Big Ten commissioner
if he refuses to do anything. I mean, any one of a number
of scenarios it can happen out there with this. It's nuts. And you
also have a team of players that are having a great year, like the
actual kids, the individuals on the team that probably likely had nothing to do
with it. Well, well that's that's the other let's stop this run right,
right, and so you have a great season and now this is happening
around right programming. That's just unfortunately and that's and that's that's the flip side
of it, the tough part of it. Well, the kids didn't have
anything to do it. They're just doing with their coaches. So you're gonna
take this away from the kids because the coaches did that. But sometimes,
you know, sometimes you got to punish the adults and the kids or you
know, are collateral collateral damage. Well that's how it usually is. Yeah,
yeah, you know, I mean, you know your dad goes to
jail. Well that's not good for the kids either, Right, I've seen
enough daylines to know that. But but you know that that is the thing,
you know. And then there's also the you know, the the you
know, the Michigan quarterback McCarthy. You know, he's a Heisman candidate.
Okay, if you know think you people think he's playing great because because of
this, because his coaches are cheating. That's true, that's true. You
know. In fact, I saw something earlier this morning where Caleb is not
the number one choice now anymore. He's you know, Williams, He's not
the number one choice. I didn't read the story to see. I don't
know. I don't know. And he's done a pretty good job outside of
the ross. He's a craphead. He's lost to in a row when I
picked him. So he's not getting my heisman. But I can tell you
that right now. Well, I'm sure he's losing a lot of sleep.
What if what if in the exactly exactly all right, Well, you know,
you feel like they got to do something. We didn't talk about this
well, we talked about this SUBS women's basketball team. Did we talk about
I don't think something at length? Just just know what the five? No,
we talked about maybe that we were going to talk about. But I
don't know what's going on. I've never seen this five five players for the
exhibition last night there they had a sixth available and she ended up having to
come into the game when one of the players hurt her shoulder right with like
thirty seconds left. But as Mary Martinez, who was supposed to be there,
she had she had a migraine. But for whatever reason, none of
these players were playing. You have to wonder is this going to be a
season long problem? Now we excuse me. We listened to ideas of postgame
press conference and she said there were probably two other players that had this been
a non exhibition game, were a much more important game, they would have
played, with Helena Playo being one of those. They said, they probably
would have you know, put some you know, given as Mary Martinez some
meds and gotten her in the game. And I think there was one other
player who could have played. So but nonetheless, you know, when you
got ten players on your roster, the margin is thin even even when you
have ten, right, even when she has five. Yeah. They played
with the running clock last night. The the it was a short night,
was in San Diego, but it was a short night. They had a
running clock to put the coach agreed to let him have a running clock,
so they ran the clock except for the last minute of each ap So you
had a short night. And I turned on the radio at seven forty five
the game was already over. Yeah. Typically it's a two hour game,
right, and it was two they were over. Yeah, and it was
fairly close. Yeah, yeah, but you know, again you could tell
you could tell the in the fourth quarter the five on the players were we're
clearly running out of gas defending and stuff like that. And Ada talked about
how, you know, she thought, you know, they really gutted it
out to you know, to just stick with it and and you know,
and play this game. But it couldn't been easy. And you know,
they still played hard and I didn't notice that they were defending. They weren't
slacking off. They played hard. They won the game. And you know
the good thing about it is at least they had all the positions covered,
right, they had They had a couple of guards. They had a you
know, and that kind of thing, so they had it wasn't like there're
anybody who's playing out a position because of that. Yeah, okay, so
but it was I've never seen that, you know, thirty thirty three years
at the table, I've never seen an exhibition or anything where there were only
five players out on the court available. Yeah, and then there was a
chance because somebody else got hurt for a moment, right right, Yeah,
well, yeah, the one of the girls who wasn't going to play,
but she came in and played the last thirty second. I think she scored
and got a block shot and stop. So they were guiding the box score,
they were talking about her. So I didn't hear the player who hurt
her shoulder. I didn't hear. You know what happened? Did you know?
It looked like she dislocated the shoulder and then popped it back in right
there, But I couldn't tell, you know, yeah, exactly. So,
well the girl two years ago, Kate Reese. Yeah, so I
don't don't know what happened there, but man, five players on the on
the court for that game kind of crazy. There's a a couple more things,
uh, Seth Davis and Jeff Goodman put out a top twenty five pre
season basketball. They each do one and then they sort of combine it to
together. When they've got there's a little lower than the others. They got
air in their in their composite. When they got Arizona at sixteen, Seth
Jeff Goodman has Arizona at nineteen, and Seth Davis has Arizona at thirteen.
So that you know there are twelfth, but the twelfth, eleventh and the
Okay, so this is Goodman and Saith Davis. Okay, two West Coast
guys. Goodman came here. And by the end in March, when Arizona's
doing really well, guess who's gonna be high fiving them in the locker room.
You can take that whatever it's worth. You know exactly what. I
know what you're saying. I know what you're saying. Do you know what
you're saying? It happens. Oh what do you mean? I didn't know
you nineteen? Yes you did? Oh man? All right? So anyway,
so that again interesting that last night. Man, if I'm a dear
Barnes, I'm worried. But yeah, even if you have seven eight I'm
worried. Yeah, because that was the thing. That's okay, five players
will take they were well, first of all, I get there and they
say they've only got five players running the clock, and I'm like, what,
Well, but they would have got a fout trouble. No get it.
They did get a technical okay, because they only put five names in
the score book. Well, then they had to bring in this one and
she wasn't in the score books, so they did. I'm just kind of
dumb that they did that, but they did call it you needed to suit
up. So this is how alarming it could be. So we had PG
Brown in the history on the show, right, miss Positive, Yes,
sort of thing. She even said buckle up. Yeah, so she says
this, you know exactly exactly. All right, let's take our break.
We're gonna come back. John Wilner of the PAC twelve hotline Santa's Americay News
will join us. We'll just have a conversation about around the PAC twelve,
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I mean, iHeartRadio WAPP. This is Eye on the Ball with Steve
Rivera and Jacob Salez on Fox Sports fourteen fifteen. Hey, welcome back to
Why on the Ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve Rivera,
He's Jacob Zellas. Now on the line, we have John Wilner from the
Pecqwolve Hotline. How you doing John, I'm good. Thanks, How you
guys, We're doing well? Things going on with the PAC twelve Anything surprising
you surprising to you, I don't know three quarters of the season, if
we're there yet. Well, Arizona's spies me a little bit. I didn't
think they would be quite this good, and you think about how close they've
been to you know, being six or two even seven and one. Defense
is much much better than I expected. They're better at the line of scrimmage,
you know, they're bigger. They just look like a major college team
up front. And certainly know if Afida has been been terrific, so Arizona
would be, you know, close to the top of the list of surprises.
You know, I can't help, you know, being being an Arizona
fan and just the fact that you know, everything bad happens at the end.
I'm sitting here as a Pac twelve fan, waiting for everything to implode,
waiting for it to just, you know, USC to go beat Washington
and Oregon to lose it to somebody that they're not supposed to and then you
know, just I'll become a mess. I mean, that's just the way
I feel about it. Well, what are you saying, I mean,
are Oregon Washington far enough ahead that they're not going to do anything stupid over
the next few weeks. Well, I mean, they got tough schedules,
that's for sure. Washing it's still got to play USC, Utah, Oregon
State, Washington State. I think Oregon is the best team, you know,
even though they lost by three points in Seattle. I mean that's you
know, tough environment, good opponent, that's you know, that's that's kind
of a neutral result in my mind. It doesn't take away from how good
they are. To me, they're the They're the best team on both sides
of scrimmage, and I don't think they're going to lose. So the question
is, well, the Huskies get through with only one loss, but patchwell
needs to have two teams in Vegas that only have one loss, one or
zero losses. That way, the winner is basically guaranteed to get to the
playoffs. Yeah, I mean that's how we see it. But you know
the problem is getting there. And again, I mean, you know who
expects I mean I thought Arizona computer Oregon State. I didn't expect it.
I thought Arizona could be Washington State. I didn't expect it, you know,
and they probably should have beat USC. So I mean, it's still
the league that anything can happen, because it's so dang deep. Yeah,
no, that's true. And Stanford and as are both one games now,
right, And a lot of it is how good is the bottom because if
the if the worst teams are competitive, then it gets much harder to get
your your top teams through unscathed. And you know, both Stanford and Will
not only have one games, but have been very close in other games different
almost be Washington. You know, ASU came close to beating Colorado and Washington,
right, So that's that's a big part of it as well. Arizona
has been, you know, better than expected and certainly has done very well.
It gets the pointspread, right, I mean, I think they've covered
seven out of their eight games because the public didn't expect this, so the
points breads don't really reflect how good they are. But they they've they've been
very very good and and I think they've got their quarterback in the future.
Yeah, no question. I still don't know if they fully believe because you
know, like Jay says, I think they're they're sitting on their edge of
their seat wondering, Okay, when's it gonna blow up under the crown?
Well, yeah, you know, I think this is gonna this is a
huge game. U c l A is really good on the defensive front.
They might have the best front seven in the conference. I mean, it's
certainly at Oregon's level and Utah's level, So it'll be real to me,
it's gonna be real interesting. I could I think this could be a hard
game for Arizona win. I thought the Cats had a better chance to beat
Oregon State than they they just beat u c l A. Interesting. So,
you know, with all as as you mentioned a minute ago, you
feel like the if both, if two teams can get to Las Vegas with
one loss or less, that that the PAC twelve is in. But yet
you see you see the the initial rankings come out in Washington, and Washington
and Oregon you know, are on the outside looking in for now and again
it's off gonna flush out and it really doesn't matter right now. But I
still thought i'd see one of the PACAF schools be in the top four.
Well, Washington isn't in the top four because the way it's played the last
two weeks. The committee was pretty clear that they didn't like the performances Gabay
issue in Stanford. So they've got you got an undefeated ACC team ahead of
them, two one beating Big ten teams and unbeatn SEC team. One of
those Big ten teams is going to have a loss here in a couple of
weeks when Michigan plays Ohio State. Uh So, to me, the pack
TWOV is still very much in really good shape to get its champion in if
that champion is twelve and one, because to block a twelve you gotta have
four teams blocking a twelve and one conference camp and that'll be hard for the
Big Ten runner up. The loser of the Michigan Ohio stateum is not going
to have a chance to play in the Big Ten championship game, whereas Washington
or Oregon would be playing Washington or Oregon in that scenario, and that's a
huge advantage on the final weekend of the season. Yeah, yeah, no
questions, no questions, no doubt. So, okay, you brought up
Michigan just real quick that stuff that's going on over there now, did you
see today there's a video showing that Connor Stallion's guy standing next to the defensive
coordinator and in slow motion it shows that he says to him, run right,
it's against Ohio State and then Ohio State runs a play where they run
to the right, and in the time after he told him to run to
the right, it looked like the Michigan guy, the defensive coordinator, had
chance to tell the defense what to do. I mean, this is the
thing is getting pretty far along. You think there's any chance in hell the
Big Ten does something about this? Well, the Big Ten coaches are furious.
Are the athletic directors are as well. Conference office is paralyzed because they
don't want to ban Michigan for the championship game. Fox is paying a lot
of money and probably wants to have the option to put Michigan in that game
if the Wolverines be Ohio State. So it's a tough spot for the Conference
office. But to me, I mean it's it's getting worse by the day.
Everyday new evidence comes out. Because everybody is so irritated about it,
they're all turning Michigan in. Yeah, right, schools are lined up to
provide evidence. I think it's horrendous. I think they should be barred from
the championship game and the playoff. I doubt the playoff will have the guts
to do it h And there should be severe sanctions. This is a massive
competitive advantage acquired illegally. Uh, and it's effected. It's a real time
deal. It's not like the recruiting thing that happened a year or two before
and the kid is already in the NBA like in basketball, right, this
is affecting the games now this season. Yeah, so we'll see if the
Big Ten Conference office has has the guts to do something. They should.
They got a new commissioner. This is a huge test of his authority and
where his allegiance lie. I think that if he doesn't do anything, he
is going to alienate thirteen schools, and one of those schools matters more than
the others. And if he gets across a cross with Ohio State that that's
not good for him. So in your latest columns, where do you have
Arizona complaint in the Bowl game? I think you had him at sun Bull
at one point. Holiday Holiday, Yeah, I think that they've got a
chance to win a couple more and you know they're going to benefit because the
Holiday doesn't want to take UCLA because the Bruins back ount of that game two
years ago and there's a lawsuit over it and uc was in the Sun Bowl
last year. So those are two games that kind of in the middle of
the pecking order, where UCLA, which is also in the middle of the
standings with Arizona, neither bowl's gonna want the Bruins, and so I think
that's going to help open up a pathway for Arizona to maybe get to a
better Bowl than folks expect. So I've got them in the Holiday. We'll
see what happens this week. You know, obviously Utah is going to be
a hard game, and U Game's gonna be hard. Yeah, yeah,
no, none of those games. You know, we've we've been saying since
the Washington game that Arizona can win all the rest of its games or lose
all the rest of its game. And we had the two games they just
won as questionable games. Yeah they were hard. They were definitely hard games.
Here's the question, and what's going to happen to the Rose Bowl.
Is it just going to become an unaffiliated playoff site, or you know,
is there something down the road where the Big Ten and another conference can still
be earmarked if it's not in the playoff part of the playoff what I don't
know what the playoff situation is once you get with the Bowl with those games,
once you get to the twelve team playoff, yeah, it's it's gonna
be unaffiliated. Right. The last Big Ten versus Pack twelve was last year
because this year it's a semi final and then next year the expanded playoff starts.
So what's gonna happen is, you know, it's a in a three
year rotation, the Rose Bowl will be a quarterfinal game two out of three
years, which means it will be played on New Year's Day like normal two
pm Pacific. It's just not going to be packed twelve verse Big Ten.
It's going to be a playoff quarterfinal two out of three years. Then the
third year in that rotation, it's going to be a semi final, which
means it'll be played, you know, somewhere around January eighth or ninth,
a week after the quarterfinals. The question is what will the game? What
will it do in those years when it's hosting a semi final on January eighth?
Will it try to stage some kind of many traditional Rose on January first?
Now that's a big sticking point because the other quarter final games don't want
to have a real Rose Bowl that's not a quarter final up against their games,
So we'll see. But that's kind of how the model is set up.
Okay, all right, So I don't want to put any PTSD in
your head, John, given what you've done in the last couple of years
with the realignment and stuff. But who do you think benefits the most football
wise, not basketballs by moving to the Big twelve? By moving to the
Big twelve, who benefits the most? And let me kind of give you
our segue because we've talked about this for a while now, Jay and I,
which of course we agree which is the shock but Arizon of benefits.
I don't know if they've benefit the most. But there's no UCLA, there's
no USC there's no Oregon, there's no Washington. Right, So that's been
one of the big determines from or detriments for you Arizona. Now they don't
have that in the Big Twelve. So which kind of team will be at
most by moving over? You're talking about just football? Just football, Basketball
is a totally different devil. Good question, I think, Utah, Yeah,
I agree to maybe because the power here, right, I mean the
schedule. We saw the schedule come out yesterday, and if you think you're
the Big the Big Twelve champ will be in the playoff, But will the
Big twelve runner up? I don't know. I think it's gonna be hard
for the league to get two teams in on a regular basis. So to
me, Utah has got an easier path, right they keep going like they're
going. They're they're probably the you know, the best program and in that
conference right then they don't have to deal with with the work in Washington and
USC anymore so to me, it just benefits the going to a league that
is more balanced but doesn't have any blue bloods just benefits the best program and
that. And that's the weird thing because you know, the Big Twelve announced
the football opponents for the next four years yesterday, and I was I looked
at all four years and I said, there isn't a team in there that
I don't think. For instance, Arizona can you know, can't be there's
not one. You know, you got b y U, TCU, Utah.
You know, who knows what Colorado is gonna do the next year.
But as you said, no, there isn't any what you call blue blood
there's anybody in there. You just think Arizona's not gonna be able to beat
any of those teams year in and year out. They can't. No,
that's true. I just I just published a column on that, like an
hour ago. The Big the blessing is the same as the curse for the
Big twelve. There's no blue bloods. There's no games other for if you're
an Arizona fan, other days, you there's no games you're circling, right,
It's not like Oregon is circling ten State coming to town. So,
but that is also the blessing because it's there's a lot of parody. It's
gonna be very competitive. Uh, there's they don't have to worry about getting
poached anymore. So it's it's it's a there there's a lot of alignment,
competitive alignment in the conference. Uh, there's no there's no games you can't
wait to see. But there's also nobody that you can't be right, right,
we got a couple of minutes here, let's switch to basketball. How
how much are you looking forward to the season and who's your pick to win
it all? I believe the season starts. Is it Monday? Monday?
Monday Monday. I'm not I'm not quite ready. It's not Christmas, but
what it feels like that I pick Kansas to win it all? But who
knows I got. I haven't spent a whole lot of time on it.
I do have Arizona my tongues, and I think either they might be eleventh,
ten or eleven. I like USC two. I think they got a
good backcourt. PAC twelve be pretty good. Uh. You know, it's
shoot, get five teams in the tournament, maybe six, Uh, we'll
see the non conference. Those first five or six weeks are huge for the
PAC twelve because it sets your net ranking, and that basically determines what happens,
you know, on selection Sunday. Okay, I'm assuming when you said
five or six, I'm assuming U C L a USC, Arizona in there.
Who who are the other three that you that you like? I think
Colorado is going to be pretty good? Uh? And I also did I
like Colorado's guy. They got a big time freshman coming in and a good
transfer. And then you know, somewhere between Oregon and ASU maybe Utah.
I think they'll they'll be a fifteen in there. Okay, all right,
Washington could be a little bit of a surprise too. Wow, which would
be a surprise, isn't What isn't their coach on the hot seat a little
bit any time on the hot seat, and he's got to get to the
tournament, I think, to save his job. Yeah. Yeah, and
they haven't been good at all. Okay, Okay, thanks John, Hey,
John, appreciate it. Man, go pick up your kid. Wait,
I know this personal buddy. So your kids playing travel baseball? What
the heck your travel baseball? Dad? Now, fortunately the travel is within
about an hour of because otherwise during college football season it be a little difficult.
Well, we'll have try with that, man. Yeah, have fun.
That's very cool. All right, all right, thanks don no good
stuff. You know again, like I said at at the top, I'm
just waiting for the pac club to just start, you know what. The
well, let's go specifically joining itself, so you know, okay, take
our break, we'llcome back. Okay, and let let's uh, let's let's
sure, let's go on with that. We'll do that. Okay, So
stick around. We're going to be back in just a few minutes. We'll
talk some more packed buff football. If you're an Arizona men's basketball fan,
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all the ex's and oh it's Steve Rovera and Jagen Salmas. This is I
on the Ball on Fox Sports fourteenth fifty. Hey, welcome back to I'm
the Mall here on Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve Rivera. You're Jiginsaus
the good Duck to John. Yeah, always good, a lot of good
insight. We were talking more about the PAC twelve. I think that the
gate crasher. The gate crasher has kind of been Arizona a little bit.
You know, we seventh eighth, but they're gonna might be finishing higher than
that. Well, you know, Oregon State came in last you know,
last week with one loss. Still have hopes of you know, go win
some games, you know, pull a couple of upsets, they've sort of
been the dark horse. Yeah, and you know, and then Arizona beat
them and kind of as their party, right, And the same with Washington
State. Washington State was you know, cruising long and all of a sudden
they get waxed by Arizona and now they're on a skid. No, they're
in't cruising anymore. Okay, cool, All right, we have a caller
and we think we know who this is. Yes, hello, coaches,
this you coach? How's it going? Oh? Who's this? That's right?
Right? Yeah, go ahead, Okay, Ray, what's on your
mind? Question about the USC game and the and there're two points converged run
by Williams. If anybody looked at that, if he actually got in the
end zone, I'm sure on the two point, no, they sacked,
They dropped him like five yards nout Williams. Caleb Williams. Yeah, he
tucked the ball inside the inside the inside the kong. Yes, he did
get in that that got played. No, no, no, no,
yeah, that was my question. Yeah, yeah it got thank you,
Ray, it got reviewed. And uh right, and he was he was
he did not step out and he did get the ball, right, if
there's anything questionable, it's the reaching the ball over the cone. But right,
but he got it around. Yeah, that was there was no argument
on that one. Right. Again, too bad for that. But what
if? What if? What if? I thought when he said Williams like
that? Uh, he was talking about DJ Williams. So oh yeah,
no, yeah, all right, so they player had no hope, it
had zero hope. Right, So we were talking about Arizona being the gate
crasher because look, they're they're better than Oregon start. You know, you
know when you we just talked about with with the with Wilner, I totally
say that. I've said this since they lost to Washington. They're the better
team there and they've kind of shown it, maybe indirectly. Uh but but
now that we know to this point, don't you think that Arizona overall is
better than Oregon State? Oregon State if they played ten times, it'd be
like a five five split. Okay, sure, okay, and then we'll
go to the other ones. Right, let's take this call. Coach is
a shoot, yes it is, coach, How were you? Thanks for
calling? This is Jim Rosborough. Jim Rosborough, a former Arizona assistant former
Iowa assistant now a PEMA College assistant. Jim, how are you really well?
Thank you? So I reached out to you, coach for one reason.
We talked to you every now and again. But I'm thinking, who
knows Bobby Knight fairly well or went against him a number of times back in
the good old days. And I know you and I have talked a number
of times about those rivalries with lut and Bobby. Tell me how intense were
they? Well, I mean, if anybody you know who wasn't around when
Knight was coaching, watched last night from these highlights and so on, I
mean it was really intense. He was you know, you hate to blast
the guy, but he was in camp. He was nasty on the referees,
on his kids, really really competitive, and you know, we were
struggling to build our program. I don't know if you guys looked up at
the first year we were at Iowa went into Indiana and we lost one hundred
and two to forty nine. And the interesting thing is we're down about thirty
with seven minutes to go. In the crowds going nuts. I mean,
it's like they're playing for the national title. It turns out that on the
back of the ticket. If you had your ticket stuff, you got a
free McDonald tamburger and a soft drink. So everybody wanted us to score under
fifty and Indiana to go over one hundred and one hundred and two to forty
nine. The rivalry, the rivalry is intense. Luke got into it big
time with the director of the bands. One time they tried to punch each
other out going off the court, and it was tough, and you know,
you always felt the referees were being intimidated by night, which probably they
were, and it was. It was a rough, rough go early but
seven. If I could just say one real quick thing, I wouldn't be
doing this show. I wouldn't be knowing you guys, I wouldn't be talking
to anybody except for by night. Because all we wanted to do when we
got Diawa was get players could score against their defense and people that could,
you know, do everything against Indiana, score against their defense and defend them.
And it wasn't easy either way. It was tough. So yeah,
I was very competitive. But when you think about that, you know,
the recruiting against him, playing against him, you know what, what were
the hardest things about that losing Isaiah Thomas. Oh wow, okay, I
mean not to say myself. I saw him at the senior in high school,
played twenty sixth times. I went in for every one of his home
games, probably the tournament. Thought we had a good shot at him.
We still had Ronnie Lester. They would have overlapped for a year, and
that was kind of heartbreaking because we worked hard. But you know, his
high school coach, like Bobby Knight run so that was hard. But otherwise
we didn't totally knock as with him. He went for maybe a little bit
different breeding kid. We were into the city of in the city, but
we didn't bump into him a whole lot other than Isaiah. That was that
was really a big one. And worked really hard on him, and that
was that was disappointing. You guys probably looked at some of the records.
I think over the last two or three years we ended up beating him five
or six times. Now we played him eighteen times nine years times too,
so they got a little bit better once we started being competitive with him.
So it was it was fun. Yeah, I was gonna say by the
end, you guys are pretty competitive, but tell me about the Everyone talks
about the undefeated year, but the year before I think they only lost one
game, right, Yeah, they were going to win the national title undefeated
again. And then I think the forwards name was Scott May and he broke
his wrists, so they whatever. Whenever they lost, they were about twenty
nine thirty two and one. They would have won it that year. And
then the next year they came back with everybody healthy and Buckner and all these
guys. I mean, they were loaded, and they they were undefeated,
and I can't remember the year seventy something. They were loaded, Kent,
Kent, Benson inside the same of pearls, their sixth and seventh man were
better than anybody we had. They were they were good. So as a
as a as a coach at I was you would have seen Bobby Knight in
environments where we as fans didn't see him. You know, there's a lot
of discussion about, you know, was it a persona was he really like
that? How much of what we saw from Bobby Knight, you know,
throwing chairs and that kind of stuff, was what really who Bobby Knight was
in terms of if you saw him behind the scenes, you know, at
a luncheon or on the recruiting trail or something like that. Well, behind
the behind the scenes, he was a totally different person. Judge Heathcote had
a heart attack after practice that day. Bobby Knight chartered a private plane and
well up East Lansing to see his competitive guy. Jud He was very,
very kind behind the scenes. One of our big kids, Steve Crastison at
the national finals one year, was there for something and befriended Bobby Knight's kid.
Two weeks later crafts and gets the letter from Night thanking him. He
was really a caring guy behind the scenes, as best I ever knew.
Really did some very very nice things. But now when it got to basketball,
dealing with his kids, his players, I mean, he was rough,
and he was he was tough. So and then you see him out
in the summer recruiting and getting looted it up in the back, you know,
in the two deans of the league. They'd sit up there and talk
and I think got along fairly well. But again, you didn't want to
start beating him because that was that was not going to make him real happy.
Behind the scenes, he was fine. No, I was going to
ask you maybe just for the last second. The relationship that he had with
Bobby did how was that well? I think he got better with time.
I mean when Luke got there, nobody really knew him, didn't know his
abilities, didn't know his skills, and we were not good. But I
think there became a mutual respect. One interesting fact, we went to the
National Tournament five years in a row eighty three through or below eighty three,
seventy eight, eighty three, and Bobby Knight had never done that. So
we were the first team in Big Ten history to go five straight years.
So then I think there became what you're asking a muse from respect. Probably
got along, probably talked basketball. I mean, I don't think they were
out there talking hunting, fishing and about their families. But I think there
was a mutroom respect, and Night knew what happened. We got good enough
to beat him several times and once killed him by thirty, so I think
he had a good respect for us. Yeah, makes sense. Hey,
Jim, thanks thanks for calling in. Good luck. We'll talk to you
soon on the new season. Very good to anytime guys you Rosboro. Yeah,
I thought I'm sure we could go into dubb I would say we only
had a couple of minutes left. I wanted to say, Okay, you
know, lut famously would not play Bobby Knight, you know, in the
regular season once he got to Arizona. You know, I'd love to hear
you know the reason, the reason, the reasoning behind that. Maybe Bobby
Knight said I'm not coming to do so and Luke said, I'm not going
to Indiana. You know what. That's probably it, right, probably yea,
rather coach k wouldn't do it. Yeah, and I'm sure Luke was
in skeptical. And now look in the next week they go to Duke exact,
Duke's coming back. Oh, yeah, exactly, exactly. I'm looking
forward to that. It's gonna be fun, you know what. I'm looking
forward to the fact that I'm gonna be in Vegas for that. That's gonna
be a blast. It should be. Yeah, that would be cool.
So that now, thanks to Jim Rosborough again for coming in and talking about
that again. You know you're seeing all the yeah, pretty much every every
oh bit of Bobby Knight. If you haven't read it, read the j
Billis story. Okay. There was a lot of response to the great piece
it's good. He's difficult, but he was his friend. You know,
you've had you might be that guy for me, difficult friends. Oh what
are you looking at me for? But you're not that fat. No,
I'm certainly not as fat as Bobby. But you know what I'm saying,
Well, you know, there are people and then they're gone and you realize,
wait a minute, I kind of like that guy. Whatever it was,
that guy. You know, there are people like that that come across
in your lives and you go, man, you were pain in the ass.
But you were pain and you were our pain in the ass, and
and we all loved you for being a pain in the ass. No,
there's no doubt that they're you know, we probably you have those trends.
You've had those trends. You to describe one or two to me, I
mean, you love them because you love them, Yeah, and no,
that's it. And so there's a lot of that going on. You know,
a lot of people saying Bobby and I was a difficult guy, but
damn it he was. He was a good guy and probably consistent. Yeah,
yeah, pretty much every one of those things that you read, you
know, Steve Alford was on on Dan Patrick this morning. You know,
he and nine you know, I mean they battled, but yeah, Steve
Alford, you know, so interesting stuff. So anyways, all right,
okay, well, thanks to John Wilner for being here, thanks to Tracy
McDonald from Bruin Blitz. He's picking the He's picking the Bruins over Arizona,
as have all of the the writers we've had on for the other team.
So so yeah, cocker. So we'll see what happens on Saturday, but
we'll be back tomorrow. We're trying to preview some more u c l A
Arizona and then as we head to the start of the regular season basketball,
so be sure to be back tomorrow. Don't believe, just line. Don't
believe just line.